Make It Burn
by JonasGrant
Summary: Andreï Volkov, a smart, cynical and somewhat idealistic mechanic, flees The Armory with his girlfriend Dasha, leaving the shelter of his home to be thrown into the hard reality that is post-apocalyptia. Out there, only the strongest survives and becoming the strongest requires more than steadfast determination...
1. Chapter 1

_Dear..._

_My dear parents, I am..._

_Hi! _

_You remember when you told me to be who I want_

_Mum, Dad, I'm leaving the station, leaving the Metro with Dasha, I'm a __Red__ Marxist, she's a Nazi and I'm no fan of romantic tragedy, so we're leaving __before...__ I love you all and I hope you understand that I love Dasha just as much, no more, no less._

_ Leaving the Metro was not the only solution, but it is the one I chose for myself, it is my decision. Nothing here is worth dying over, I used to think my family would be worth fighting for, but you refused to fight for me when I asked... Call me a traitor if it makes you feel better, but know that your own betrayal pushed me to this, as you always said, the actions of one are the responsibility of all. _

_Sorry,_

_Andreï._

* * *

The Hanza guard observed both young stalkers, his doubt obvious even behind a thick wool balaclava. The boy was armed, carrying a bastard gun and revolver, she looked like an officer's kid, too clean and nervous to have ever seen the sky.

The kid couldn't have been older than twenty, but looked tough enough to have at least worked as a caravan guard before, tiny scars dotting the right side of his face and his exposed forearms revealing rod-like tendons under a thick skin.

One thing bothered the Hanza, however, and that was the kid's trench coat, clearly a Red uniform tinkered with to look banal, insignias removed and an ammunition carrier worn over the leather coat.

"You a deserter or something?" The tall man asked, his shotgun held firmly and eyes narrowed in a mildly accusing manner.

The girl cringed and the boy seemed taken aback, shocked that his 'genius plan' had failed. To his credit, however, he kept his head and played it straight.

"I worked in the armory, I'm a mechanic." His voice betrayed no fear, no hesitation, it was a story-teller's voice, the kind people flocked to camp fires just to listen. Not a warrior, definitely.

The guard nodded to the girl, "And her?"

"Personal assistant to the Fuhrer, one of many." His tone made it clear that, if intentions alone could kill, the fascists would have been looking for a new leader right this instant.

None of this qualified as Hanza's business, truth be told, but the man had been manning this station for five years and these two certainly would be in his top five most interesting encounters…

Simply put, the guy was bored out of his mind, so he made them an offer, "How about you stick around until dawn? It'll be safer then and you can tell us more," seeing the two hesitate, he promptly added, "And we might even teach you a thing or two on how not to die up there."

As far as incentives go, this was a pretty good one, so the kids simply nodded to each other before following the sentry into the guard booth.

The booth, built from scrap right next to the gate, was occupied by two more sentries, one manning a gun emplacement and the other keeping tabs. This tunnel saw little use, most of it outbound, very few ever came back, meaning these two were in the same situation as their colleague; bored to tears.

The kids sat on a crude wooden bench, snuggling close to one another.

"So, you two are, like, enemies, right?" Said the gunner, his back resting against the weapon.

Andreï, the boy, kept his gaze on the ground and replied with honesty, "I don't give a flying fuck about it."

The other man looked up from his manifest to frown, "This reminds me of some old story… Any of you planning to feign their death or something?" Earning only confused glances, he shrugged it off and went on to complete a requisition form for two spare survival kits.

"How did you even meet?" The gunner continued, squeezing out of the way as his friend with the shotgun went for the supply crate, buried beneath dirty clothes and spare parts.

Andreï smiled, giving his girlfriend a tender glance that was mirrored somewhat awkwardly. She seemed pale, even for a Metro dweller, almost sickly, as if this situation somehow made her nauseous. "A month ago, I was riding a caravan to Polis from the Armory, not a Red Line operation per see, but they asked me and a security team to escort it, as a gesture of goodwill towards the Rangers or something…"

The shotgun wielding sentry began stuffing filters, rations and med-packs in two leather rucksacks. Noticing all the attention he'd drawn to himself, the man apologized and went on, cautious not to disturb the story-telling.

"So, I was checking on the car's secondary hydraulics, about two hours into our trip, fixing a leak just on the left side of the car, when the driver just stopped the whole thing. _Bang!_ Forty to nothing in two seconds. I don't have to tell you I wanted to smack the bastard, but then I looked ahead and kissing him felt somehow appropriate then…"

The gunner popped out a cigarette from a semi-crumbled pack before offering it around, everyone accepted but the girl, who never acknowledged his presence, "Ghosts?" he guessed, flicking on an old lighter.

Andreï set his own fake tobacco stick alight, puffing on it twice before resuming the story. "Nope; a panzer. The thing had been hit by a few demo charges and it vomited smoke like old drunks vomit shroom vodka, that's why we didn't see it before then and we'd have squashed on its armor hadn't the driver been so fucking quick…"

He repositioned the cigarette to the corner of his mouth, "So, there we are, face to face with a maybe functional tank with only a few bastards and a kalash to back us up, and the thing just sits there, its main gun pointed at us and smoke gushing out from across its frame… I was scared shitless and so was everyone else, but one of the guys decides to play hero and shoots the thing with a Bastard…"

The writer whistled in admiration, "How did it not blow you to pieces?"

The boy finally looked up from the floor, tired grey eyes sparkling with humor, "It was inches away from falling apart, so when the _hero_ shot it, that's all it took for the remaining bolts to give and whole plates to fall off..."

"Hang on a second," shotgun guy interrupted, "the guy killed a panzer with a Bastard?"

Andreï laughed lightly at that, shaking his head, "No, no, no, the tank was already dead, he just knocked down bits of it, which didn't keep him from roaring his victory until the commissar smacked him quiet."

Andreï paused to check on the girl, giving her a warm smile that was met with a thin one.

"So, the grunts get off to check out why there's a fucking tank on the tracks and I get to check out the thing, see if it can be fixed. I put on my gas mask, check my gun and crawl in through a hole in the armor… A panzer's really tight, you can't stretch, can't twist and can't scratch without bumping against something important-looking, and this one was worst because there were corpses plastered all over the cabin… Still I managed to shut the engine and that cleared out the smoke some, not to mention the noise. Then, when it all finally quieted down, I heard sobbing somewhere nearby, practically within spitting distance…"

He squeezed the girl's shoulder protectively and she smiled again, her traits softer this time.

"…My guess is Dasha had been in the turret when the thing blew up, she was ejected by the blast, then crawled back in when the nosalises came looking, but she won't tell me about it, wouldn't talk at all when we found her… The others argued we should shoot her, I didn't care much, but the commissar opted to capture her and bring her back to base, so the trip wouldn't be a complete waste, seeing as that tank wasn't going anywhere…" He stroked the Bastard's grip, "The others beat her up, humiliated her… Made me mad, but I shut up, then they _interrogated _her at the armory, maybe three meters away from my bunk… For a week, every morning, I saw her, in her cell, sobbing in a corner or screaming for food… I brought her food, guards tried to stop me, but I still did, and we talked, nothing of your concern, then, one night, two guards entered her cell… They weren't asking questions and she just screamed…"

Tears ran down his cheeks, two salty pearls rolling across the dirt. Her face, however, was set in stone.

"That was yesterday. You can guess the rest."

The sentries seemed torn between scorn and admiration. It took a lot of balls to just ditch everything over personal convictions, it took a lot of stupidity to do so over a girl and it just felt wrong to betray his station by freeing a captured enemy.

The gunner openly applauded the kid for being a ballsy motherfucker while the writer's face twisted to a severe frown. "You should think before you do shit like that, lad, recklessness will get you killed out there."

The last guard thrust the two backpacks onto the fugitives, "The line between conviction and recklessness is good planning, do the right thing, but be smart about it… Now move it, dawn's breaking, you'll be safe for an hour or so, until diurnal hunters get warmed up."

Andreï slung both his bag's straps and adjusted them carefully while Dasha simply hung it over her shoulder.

Gunner cranked the gate up and locked it there to man his weapon, spotlight searching the darkness beyond.

"Thanks," shouted the boy, over his shoulder as he jogged away in the dark, "I won't forget it."

The girl followed closely, never looking back.

The gate was closed and all three guards just stared at it for a while, re-playing the boy's story in their minds, wondering what they would have done…


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: So, no, this isn't a love story, don't you guys know me by now? It's a story about the horrors of the world, and not just post-apocalypse, but more importantly, it was inspired by the song Make it bun dem as it appeared in Far Cry 3... Those who played the game will get it, those who didn't are missing out on some serious fun.**

**HowAboutThisForAName: Enjoy it while it lasts xD**

The maintenance tunnel led to a frozen shed, built into the side of an overpass. Andreï tried the door, but it was fused with the frame by a layer of ice about two fingers thick.

"Look around," he spoke, checking his backpack for something to melt or break the ice, "might be another way out."

Dasha simply nodded, scanning around with the yellow ring of her flashlight.

About four meters by six and two meters high, the shed used to hold tools from before the war, as evidenced by the many lockers and toolboxes lying around, but stalkers had long since cleared it out, leaving only whatever junk they deemed useless.

A shelf, frozen at a steep angle in the center of the room, drew her attention first. Maybe there were things on top of it stalkers hadn't seen. So she climbed the frozen furniture, spiked boots keeping her steady on the thin layer of ice, but found nothing and climbed back down with a silent curse.

"Forget it, anything worth taking is long gone," Scoffed Andreï, "just look for an exit."

She mocked a salute, but got to it, checking the walls and ceiling for grates, vents, hatches or plain old windows.

A square on the far side of the room seemed promising and she moved closer to inspect it, finding no handles nor hinges, she squinted at the thing, trying to make out any mechanism in her torch's flickering halo, finally giving up with a growl, "I need batteries."

By then, Andreï , down on a knee, had emptied half his pack, setting every item on the floor before writing something on his pad, the leather backed journal cautiously balanced on his knee... An inventory. Dasha rolled her eyes at the sight; trapped in an ice cube and that idiot was taking stocks? She walked up to him when he motioned for her to.

Andreï then quickly looked around in the junk and picked a universal charger from a pile of electrical parts, holding it out for her. "You should have one in your pack too, I guess." He pointed out as she began operating the crank.

The yellow ring turned to a white donut after five cranks or so and Dasha tossed charger back to its owner before resuming her inspection.

Turns out the square sheet of metal was just that, a plate of sheet metal, wide enough for a man to fit through, but bolted down it two places and frozen over.

Seeing as the shed itself was made of concrete, this thing might just be their way out…

"Think we could blast through this?" She poked the plate a little before giving it a good kick, without result other than a sore ankle.

Andreï held up a single pipe bomb. He'd been surprised to find it strapped to the pack, people rarely just parted with weaponry in Metro. He set it back down carefully. "We could, but it would draw attention. Better keep it as last resort."

Dasha groaned and spun on her heels, once again searching the room for a way out.

"Ridiculous," she opened every locker, the white donut dancing around in them for a second before jumping to the next, "got through the whole Metro without a hitch and now we're trapped by frozen water."

The next to last cabinet actually contained a small pistol, .44 caliber, made with toys and pipes. She quickly checked the drum and slipped the thing in her backpack.

"Still nothing useful?" Dasha dragged her feet back to the boy and he carefully put everything back in the bag.

"A lighter." he held the thing before her. It shone in the light, remnants of a chrome finish proudly poking through the rust. "For what it's worth."

Did that idiot really hope to melt this much ice with a Zippo? Before she could voice her… Concerns, however, a new spark flicked to life in Andreï's eyes and he fumbled around in a large pouch, on his belt, before yanking out a full clip of dirty ammo.

"We'll use the black powder to break the ice!" He quipped, proudly, and never waited for her answer, getting to work instantly.

Removing the lead tip of the first bullet proved challenging, but by the fifth round, the young mechanic knew how to do it right and the rest follower within five minutes.

Using a sheet of paper from his note pad, Andreï rolled a thin funnel that he kept shut with his thumb while he dug a trench along the metal's edges using the knife in his other hand.

Once that task was complete, he turned to Dasha, "Get me some light."

She did as asked and he proceeded to pour black powder into the notches. Some of it fell to the floor, mixing with ice crystals, but most stuck to the frozen water and when Andreï set it ablaze, the ice promptly retreated, as if shying away from the sparkling powder. A good kick and the plate flew off into the street. Andreï squeezed through, his SMG pointed loosely toward the street, and quickly looked around once he was on the surface.

Busted cars, lined up in the street, failed to conceal a massive crack where sewers had caved in. far to the left, the skeleton of a skyscraper rose about fifty meters above ground, the remnants of its concrete and glass flesh littering the area and blocking both streets that ran by its sides. To the right, the overpass stretched above the crack, having somehow survived whatever split the road that ran beneath it.

Rubbles had semi-buried the shed, most likely from that building to the left, leaving only the street side exposed.

Finally, Andreï looked up, scanning this gigantic grey ceiling through the cracked glass of his mask… People talked about shivers down the spine, cold sweats or even weakness in the knees when they first glanced at the sky. He felt none of that. Sure, the thing looked nice, but the novelty wore off quickly, though the vertigo persisted until he turned back to the hole and held out his hand for Dasha.

She took it and he pulled her out quickly, if somewhat roughly.

"Damn it's cold in here..."

He scoffed, "_Out _here."

Ignoring the boy, Dasha climbed on an old pickup truck, trying to get her bearings. "According to the map, the library is two hundred meters north," she pointer past the piles of rubble, to the apartment building across the street buried up to the second floor by fallen rubble, "We might be able to go through there…" The crack, within spitting distance of her observation point, seemed to only now catch the girl's attention and she almost spat at it, but stopped herself seconds before launch, carefully removing the gas mask clinging to her face before spitting a blob of mucus to the ground somewhat sheepishly.

"Real sweet," laughed Andreï, a smile tugging at his lips. The young stalker strolled up to a lamp post, the thing bent halfway over the crack, and pulled a thick leathery rope from his belt.

"Indiana Jones?" Dasha cocked her hips, head tilted slightly to the right.

"More like Tarzan." Tying a loose knot around the post's base, Andreï threw the loop up along the thing's length, closing the noose with a light tug. "Janes first." He offered, stepping aside in a gentlemanly manner.

"No way I'm swinging on that thing…" There is a rule in post-apocalyptic Moscow, one every stalker and ranger abides and would unanimously declare the most important rule of all; _Keep moving._

The demon that swooped down then gladly instructed both humans on that rule, Dasha emitted a shrill sound, halfway between a curse and a scream, as Andreï was lifted off the ground by powerful talons.

The boy's .44 flashed twice, illuminating a gargoyle-like face and membranous wings as they created twin whirlwinds of snow, dragging the Demon's victim ever higher until the rope reached the end of its length, yanking the boy from his captor's grip, only for him to slam against the lamp post, slip and finally dangle from his now dislocated shoulder.

Pain shot from the tip of his finger to that of his coccyx, cold, electric and mind numbing. Above, the Demon was coming back around to get its prey back.

"Watch out!" Dasha, completely panicked, ran back and forth between the truck and the shed, unable to decide what to do next.

Andreï really didn't fare much better, but managed to stop the creature's dive with three more shots from his revolver, buying himself a few precious seconds, which he used to check out his arm, tangled up in the rope, twisted at an impossible angle.

Red and yellow lights were dancing before his eyes, the gun muzzle pressed against leather. Last shot.

The rope cracked loudly and shot up while he went down. Andreï saw it roll once around the street light, far out of reach, then hit the bottom of the fissure, a bone suddenly protruding from his chest, and darkness surrounded him.


	3. Chapter 3

From his early childhood, Andreï had been considered a complete idiot. Other kids would dare him to do forbidden or gross things and Volkov would always fall in their trap, getting caught or sick every time.

One time, a girl his age had convinced the boy that a merchant had stolen her rat and he'd agreed to steal it back for her, resulting in a visit to the security chief's office and the loss of what few toys Andreï possessed.

By the time he turned twelve, however, Andreï's reputation had switched from that of a slow witted chubby child to a clumsy but kind hearted force of nature. Though still somewhat naïve and hardly a philosopher, Andreï had quickly developed an affinity with electronics, mechanical devices and even electricity, most likely as compensation for his lack of friends or distraction, but this was still hardly noticeable features at the time.

The trait that really made him famous within the Armory was his stunning physical strength and endurance, superior at the time to some grown men.

At seventeen, Andreï, standing just over six foot and weighting around two hundred pounds, landed a job in the Red vehicle depot, first as heavy labor, where his physical feats, though well above average for his age and size, went unnoticed.

To this day, Volkov still saw himself as the clumsy but strong boy, effortlessly lifting boxes that made grown men crumble, he took comfort in that label, being too slow for combat and too dumb for science secured him in his manual laborer mold, mold which now looked deceivingly like a rusty Volkswagen.

The boy sat up, numb throbbing filled his chest and shoulders.

A dried skeleton laid beneath him, crushed to splinters except for a single bloodied rib, the same that impaled him after his fall. A look to his perforated chest revealed some glue like substance sealing to wound and it took him a minute to realize his dislocated shoulder had been popped back into place.

Why would someone patch his wound and leave without an explanation or farewell? No satisfying answers rose above the whirlwind of speculation that rattled the boy's mind, so he discarded the broken revolver in his hand in favour of the Bastard gun strapped to his backpack.

Plenty of cars littered the irradiated crevasse, allowing the stalker to hop forward looking for a way out. He wanted to shout, let Dasha know everything would be fine, but that would have attracted hungry things and he felt quite humbled by his last encounter with one of those.

As he passed a minivan, whispers began to rise along the back of his brain, "_Death…Awaits… Him…"_ They spoke, _"He… Is not… Strong…"_

Stopping dead in his track, Andreï quickly surveyed the surrounding concrete cliffs, not truly expecting to find anything…

But he did; a single dark shape, seated atop an overturned delivery truck, the truck itself precariously balanced between both sides of the gap.

"I'm stronger than I look." He countered, his weapon down for now. That _thing_ would have attacked right away had it meant him harm, no reason to be rude, even to some ghostly figure that sent shivers all the way to his socks.

"_Not… Enough… Cannot hide… Cannot run… Strong… Not… Enough…"_

It felt like a bad radio transmission, not a speech impediment, just bad reception. The thing was having trouble with whatever mind trick it used in lieu of talking. Or maybe Andreï simply didn't have the hardware to decipher it…

Still, the message was clear; _Yeah, you're strong, but not enough to compete with a Demon, you're not trained to be sneaky and you're too slow to outrun them…_

"My friend's out there, I can't leave her!"

"_Girl… Hide… Run… Safe. He leave… He leave or he dies…"_

Andreï hopped closer to the shape, so he wouldn't have to yell anymore.

"Can't you help me find her? She's all I have left!" It struck him just as the words left his mouth. He'd left his family, his station and his life to be with her and now that too would be taken away…

"_We can… But he will die… Not strong enough… Not yet."_

This sparked a warm spot in the boy's chest. Hope… Or his wound re-opening…

"What do I need to do? How do I become stronger?"

"_Adapt… Overcome…"_ The thing pointed an elongated finger to the sky, where a Demon was getting in position for a dive, _"Survive…"_

The Demon was getting closer, clearly diving straight for the young stalker. Andreï got moving then, absently noting the shape had vanished… He passed the delivery truck just as the Demon landed on the car before him, forcing the Russian to stop himself and fumble into an awkward one-eighty turn, back into the truck's shade and the bed of an old Dodge, where a layer of ice sent him spinning backward and on his butt.

This worked in his favour as the Demon's jaw snapped overhead uselessly a split second later. The creature itself crashed straight into the same minivan Andreï had been standing on earlier, going through the spider-webbed windshield like a rock through tissue paper, allowing the boy to empty half his clip into the squirming creature.

It soon stopped, its breathing raspy and the roars replaced by high pitched whines.

Dirty bullets pack a shitty punch at best; the lead tip and low grade powder far from rivaling actual military grade rounds, to the point that they sometimes failed to punch through a man's ribs or skin. Instead of wasting more ammunition on the downed creature, Andreï drew his knife and hopped to the van, where he dodged the monster's jaws twice before finally digging the blade into its throat.

"Satisfied?"

The dark shape had returned to its spot. _"He can bring death… But death will come for him… He cannot run… He needs… Protection…"_

"I don't know of any armor that can stand up to demons…"

"_We… Know…"_

"Huh," he walked up to the delivery truck's driver door, and used the cabin as a ladder, emerging from the passenger side to take a seat by the dark one's side, "then please tell me, Dasha needs me."

"_She is safe…" _Then it got up, leading the boy deeper into the city.


	4. Chapter 4

The Nazi commander sucked on his cigarette, the burning tip casting a hellish glare on his face, then blew smoke out of his nose, replacing the glare with a blue mist for a few seconds.

"You say you revealed nothing?" He spoke, softly, to the cuffed woman ahead.

Dasha nodded twice, hesitantly, "The boy freed me before my transfer to the Lubyanka, why else would I be here?"

It was the officer's turn to nod. He tapped the cigarette on the edge of an ashtray and pretended to be thinking hard about the situation. "Where is the boy now?" He finally asked, interest obvious in the man's tone.

"Dead." Was all she said.

"Did you love him?"

Her eyes snapped up, fixing him in his seat like Hellsing bolts, "No."

The officer had planned to push her harder, call her cold and try to make the girl snap, but this glare, this 'I own you' vibe she'd managed to throw at him, changed his mind. This woman was one of the Fuhrer's assistants and he reminded himself not to forget that again…

Then, the alarm bell began ringing frantically, the man hitting it obviously panicked beyond any reason.

The commander ran up to a rusted intercom, next to the rotten door.

"Report!" He roared, his .44 drawn uselessly.

The voice on the other end hardly made any sense through all the shooting and screaming. "The devil! It's burning us! We shoot it but it keeps coming! It wants the girl herr officer, we must give it the girl! Please, wait! I don't know wh… No!" Then, the words lost all coherent structure, replaced by mindless animal screams of pain and terror.

The screaming went on for what seemed like hours before melting away, replaced by a rasped breathing, a simple pump-like sound that carried so much hatred, the Nazi could only agree with his dead man. The devil himself was on the line.

"All units," He breathed over the intercom, "find the intruder and kill it."

No answer.

The breathing had ceased and there was nothing else to be heard, so the man retreated behind an old drawer, containing rotten police files, a grenade readied in his hand.

Dasha joined him, still cuffed. "Untie me!" She pleaded, hands held out toward him. He fumbled around his pockets for the key, but just as he found them, the NBC seal outside the door, the only thing that keeping the toxic atmosphere out, was breached and both Nazis began suffocating.

He managed to put his own gas mask on, but completely disregarded the choking woman in favour of chucking his grenade at the door.

The fuse sizzled and crackled for a few seconds before finally blasting smithereens outward and into whatever stood on the other side.

The thing did not flinch.

It walked through the smoke and dust, a massive shape, akin to a Librarian with shorter arms and a huge head.

As it stepped into the light, the commander noticed it had no fur, but instead wore the blue white and gray camo pattern of pre-war Russia.

He, not it, carried a military flame thrower, the blue ignition flame blending with the Explosive Ordinance Disposal suit's coloring. This was no monster, this was just a man with one of these massive suits EOD teams used before the war to disarm explosives, and carrying an old, barely functional flamethrower!

"You little fuck!" The officer roared as Andreï primed his flamethrower.

"_Little_ might not be accurate…" He finally noticed Dasha, now almost purple, and swiftly unclipped a gas mask from his belt, throwing it at the girl.

Her extremities now numb and water filling her eyes, Dasha failed to catch the thing and the officer stomped on it the second it hit the floor, breaking the glass and rendering the mask useless.

"You can't win," The Nazi laughed, smugly, "She's as good as dead!"

The victorious smile on the man's face melted as Andreï dropped the flamer without a second thought.

Both knew exactly why Volkov decided not to fry the Nazi; there was still one gas mask left in the room…

Andreï charged like a bull, driving all of his mass into an outstretched elbow…

Except when he stepped over the overturned drawer , the officer swiftly kicked his legs form under him, sending Volkov to crush the desk beyond .

"You inbred shit," He laughed, .44 magnum back in hand, "You thought you could defeat a fourth reich officer because you found some fancy armor?"

On the ground, Dasha stopped twitching, her desperate gasps for breaths ceasing as well.

The revolver appeared in Andreï's visor and his hand snapped up. The shot scratched his helmet, but caused no damage beyond a serious migraine and ear bleeding.

"I will break you." Was all Andreï said, his grip tightening like a vice around the Nazi's wrist. The officer tried to squeeze out more shots, but tendons in his hand were too compressed to move the fingers.

Volkov got back on his massive boots, slowly twisting the man's arm in the process, until it reached the point where he could have licked his own elbow by simply sticking out his tongue.

"Fuck… You!" The Nazi choked out as Andreï tore his gas mask off.

Volkov kicked him in the balls twice then left the whimpering slab of meat to put the mask on his unmoving girlfriend.

"I told you I don't like tragedies," He growled when her chest failed to resume moving, "So fucking breathe," He punched he on the sternum once, "Would you kindly?"And she sat up, gasping desperately for air she thought she'd never breathe again. In one fluid motion, Dasha drew Andreï's knife from his boot, both hands still bound, shoved him aside and stabbed the officer repeatedly in the neck. The man had crept up behind Volkov, who hadn't thought of disarming the Nazi.

The only thing holding the officer's head in place, by the time she passed out, was his spine, completely stripped of meat…

Andreï, long since back on his feet, sat on the floor, leaning on the file cabinet, waiting for the guilt to settle. He'd just toasted eight men, roasting them alive like a pack of bothersome lurkers, their dying screams echoing in the tight confines of his helmet.

The cocktail of combat drugs in his blood supressed such emotions, however, and he was left feeling empty yet victorious.


End file.
